by Eva Chase
West’s jaw tightened at the mention of the fae, but he nodded. “Don’t cut it too close,” he told me gruffly.
“I know,” I said, suddenly choked up.
He turned to Bertrand. “You heard her. Get a bunch of our people, the fastest fighters, ready to dash for the forest the second she goes over the wall.”
His lieutenant gave a jerky bob of his head and rushed off. Within moments, he’d rounded up a pack near the gate. I marched the last few steps to the wall and pitched my voice to carry over it.
“Rogues!” I shouted. “And your vampire allies. This is your last chance to back down before I destroy all of you. Leave here and call off your forces around all our communities, and we can discuss a new treaty. Stay, and you’re going to burn.”
“Big words from a little girl hiding behind a wall, dragon shifter!” the rogue hollered. “I’d like to see you try. In the meantime, should I describe what we did to your fathers after you fled? We pissed on them, you know, and then we—”
I shut my eyes, shutting him out, clamping down hard on the rush of fury that surged through my chest again. “No movement from the vampires,” one of the guards reported.
Fine. I hadn’t really expected anything else.
“I’m going,” I said to West. “I’ll be back. I promise.”
Then I launched myself off the ground.
The wind whipped over my expanding body. I flung myself high with a vast sweep of my wings.
My sharp eyes caught the cluster of four shifters just a step from the edge of the trees, twenty feet from our wall. A whiff of their scents reached my nostrils.
Jackal. The grizzled man with white streaked hair who was hollering more insults at me even now was a jackal shifter. A scavenger, happy to desecrate the dead for his own gain. How fucking fitting.
I let out a furious shriek and dove. At the edge of my vision, I saw my kin slipping over the wall and darting across the cleared ring into the trees farther down the estate. The rogues raised their guns. They didn’t need any special angle to get a shot at me. Bullets pinged off my wings and chest, the distance offsetting the damage they might have done. I careened faster, closer—
And whipped myself to the side before I came into full range. The rogues let out a shout of surprise.
Then a different sort of shouting echoed from within the forest. Shots crackled and bullets thudded into tree trunks. Bodies thumped to the ground. Snarls and the slicing of claws through undead flesh carried from below.
The rogues spun around, and so did I. My heart thumped hard in my chest. While the vampires were otherwise occupied, I could finish what I’d come out here wanting to do.
The jackal shifter looked up at the last second. He bared his teeth in a sneer and yanked up his gun. But I was already pouring flames from my throat.
In an instant, my dragon fire had swallowed up all four of the rogues. Their forms toppled into heaps of cinders. A small part of the clenching around my chest released.
They were gone. The last of them were gone.
But the vampires, our greatest threat, were still here. “Retreat!” one of the canine guards shouted. The kin who’d tackled the vampires amid the trees streamed back toward the walls.
I dove toward them, aiming a burst of flames at the vampires who charged after my kin. Gunfire echoed around me. A bullet tore through my foreleg; another, my shoulder. The truck’s engines revved. Forget stealth. They were storming us now.
I aimed one last blast at the ring of firewood, as long as that might hold us, and flung myself toward the courtyard. These weren’t the only vampires we needed to deal with. My kin were fighting all over this country.
And I would lend my flames to help them.
I hit the ground still in dragon form, right beside the fae woman. She didn’t need any further prompting. I opened my jaws, and she held out her hands. With a heave of my lungs, all the firepower I had in me gushed out to meet her magic.
The heat and the light flowed away from me. I felt it go, in a strangely detached sensation. Felt it rush from me to the fae woman to all the fae around the estate. Felt the sizzle of the fire streaming from their hands to hit the trucks racing at the protective ring, at the vampires pouring out bullets from the edge of the forest.
And onward, from them to the fae to the south and the west. I could almost hear Marco calling commands to his lieutenants, Nate growling as he bashed the head of a bloodsucker who’d made it to his wall, Aaron commanding a legion of eagles, hawks, and falcons.
All my mates, with me even while they weren’t. My fire reached them all. Them and the smaller towns and villages where more fae had gathered. More fire washing over the charges of vampires. Bloodsuckers bursting into ashes. Flaring on and on until the sensation of it made me dizzy.
Or maybe that lightheadedness was from the effort to keep producing so much fire. My whole dragon body was tingling. But I had so much more in me to give. So many kin I wanted to protect.
Even as I sensed the paths my flames traveled along, the battle in front of me waged on too. West barked orders and sprang to help the guards by the gate. Kylie shouldered her flame-thrower and shot a blast into the chaos on the other side of the wall. My kin raced by all around me, gathering the injured, joining the defense, fighting with everything we had. All of us, together, bound by blood and history and a friendship with the glimmering figures among us that we were only just rediscovering.
“They’re retreating!” someone hollered. Here, or at one of the other estates I was distantly connected to? Footsteps thundered. Fire crackled. My throat burned, but I expelled another long breath. The tingling had faded, leaving only the comfortable weight of my dragon form. Just as much mine as my human one.
I could do this. I could stand and fight all night if I needed to.
But I didn’t need to. More shouts rang out, and at least some of them were definitely here. “That’s the last of them! The ring is clear.”
The fae woman lowered her hands. I let my flames flicker out. She beamed at me, as brightly lit as if the moon had shone a spotlight from her.
“It’s done,” she said.
I was done. I could shift back now, if I wanted. I stretched my dragon limbs and raised my head toward the sky, letting out a hoarse cry of victory. Only then, carefully and because I wanted to, did I pull back into my human self.
Chapter 21
West
If someone had told me a week ago—no, even a day ago—that I’d be entertaining the leader of the local fae on my estate grounds, I’d have laughed my head off. And then given whoever had said it a good cuff across the head for coming up with ridiculous stories.
But here I was. Walking the gardens to the east of the house in the thin dawn light with one of those gawky glowing figures.
To be honest, the sight of her still made my skin crawl. Too many sour memories. I could ignore that, though. I was man enough to admit when I’d been wrong. And to listen to someone else admit the same.
“We have a long way to go,” the fae woman said. “On both our sides.” She fixed me with a sharp look, as if to remind me that my kin had played a role in the tensions between us. I’d let that slide too, at least this once. “But I am ashamed of the violence that was borne out of what should have been a simple misunderstanding. I hope that we can approach each other with an assumption of good faith… or at least neutral faith, from now on.”
“I think we can offer that,” I said. And then, because that statement didn’t feel like enough. “And I would like us to go forward that way. With patience instead of suspicion. If we can.”
All right, so we might both be hedging our bets a little when it came to agreeing to a truce. Old habits died hard. And there was still—
The fae’s voice quieted. She stopped and turned toward me. “I must apologize, for the deaths when my people drove you from that grove twelve years ago. Killing is never our goal. I should have been there to temper the panic.”
I gape
d at her for a second before I found the wherewithal to snap my mouth shut. “Those lives can’t be brought back by an apology,” I said, but without as much anger as I might have if the apology hadn’t sounded so heartfelt.
“They can’t,” the fae woman acknowledged with a bob of her head. “The best I can give is my promise that my people will not cross that line first in any conflict from here on.”
I supposed if my kin started slaughtering fae sometime in the future, I couldn’t really complain if they paid us back in kind. But I had no intention of stirring up violence on our end. No, I’d be much happier if we simply left each other alone unless absolutely necessary.
Hopefully my mate didn’t have other plans she’d end up dragging me into.
The fae leader motioned to my chest—to the area just below my shoulder where my flesh prickled around the glow of my bandaged scar. “You were injured in that fight,” she said. “Our magic left its mark. I could heal the scar, if you wanted. As a gesture of our good will.”
I hadn’t thought I could be more surprised by her, but it took all I had not to let my jaw go slack again. My hand rose to the scar instinctively. But I didn’t need much time to find my answer.
“Thank you,” I said, meaning it. “But no. It’s a reminder I’d like to keep.”
Her eyes hazed with momentary confusion. “A reminder?”
“Of the sacrifice I made that day,” I said. And of my feelings, just in case I got too focused on burying them again.
“It is your choice,” the fae woman said calmly. “I will take my leave of you. May our paths cross only in peace.”
I turned back toward the house. I’d only just come around into the front courtyard when Bertrand came striding over to meet me.
“We’ve gotten word from the kin we sent to New York,” he said. “Just before sunrise this morning, the vampires who survived last night converged on their king. Apparently they were pretty peeved about the catastrophic war he’d gotten them into, and not in any hurry to continue throwing themselves into the flames. The report is that they tore off his head and then tossed his body outside the meet the sun.”
I grimaced. “Sounds fitting. So now they don’t have a king.”
“No, they agreed on a new one in a hurry.” Bertrand’s eyes glinted with amusement. “The new king has already reached out to the estate to talk about reparations and compromise.”
A laugh burst out of me. Damn, when was the last time I’d felt like I could really laugh? I sucked in the dewy morning air, and the last of the tightness around my lungs released.
“Of course he is. Take on the fae and this dragon shifter along with all of our kin? After last night, he’d have to want to see his own people exterminated to make that order.”
“Do you want to speak to him?” Bertrand asked.
I shook my head. “Tell the bloodsuckers we’re thinking about what kind of ‘compromise’ we’d find acceptable. Let them stew a little. I’ve got other things I’d rather focus on right now. Speaking of which, where’s our dragon shifter?”
“Still in her rooms, as far as I know, sir.”
Ren had stayed up most of the night with me helping with the recovery efforts and making sure the vampires weren’t going to return. I’d finally sent her off to bed a few hours ago. The fact that she’d barely protested gave me some indication of how exhausted she’d been.
I should probably get a little rest myself. But that could wait a little longer too. Right now, I wanted my mate.
No one answered when I knocked softly on the door to Ren’s suite. I eased the door open. The corner of my mouth curved up.
My dragon shifter hadn’t even made it to her bed. She’d curled up on the sitting room sofa, hugging one of the plump pillows, her face gentle with sleep. Her dark brown hair tumbled over her naked shoulder.
There was a lot to appreciate about the view, but my gaze stayed on her face, my heart squeezing. This woman. This goddamned woman. I’d almost let her go. And then I’d almost pushed her away. What the hell had I been thinking?
I couldn’t imagine loving anyone else this much, now or ever.
I knelt down beside the sofa and rested my head against her side. I hadn’t meant to wake her, not exactly, but when she murmured and reached to stroke her fingers over my hair, I couldn’t say I was upset either.
“Is everything all right?” she asked, her eyes only half open. Fuck, she looked even more irresistible like that.
“You know what?” I said. “It is, and I think it might actually stay that way for more than an hour just this once.”
She smiled then, so brilliantly I had to kiss her. She scooted forward into my embrace, raising her head to kiss me back harder.
Tired? Who was tired? I could stay awake another week if I was doing this.
Ren snuggled her head against my shoulder. “I want you,” she said, her voice still dreamy. “But I want to see all my mates. Soon.”
“That’s what I came to tell you,” I said. “The other alphas are heading to the dragon shifter estate now. I’ll take you there to meet up with them. What do you say we catch up on a little more sleep on the plane?”
She hummed happily. “Sounds like the perfect plan. As long as you’re right there beside me.”
I couldn’t restrain the smile that stretched across my face. “Forever and always, Sparks.”
Ren
Aaron, Nate, and Marco were waiting at the edge of the runway when I got to the jet’s open doorway. Suddenly my feet couldn’t move fast enough. I scrambled down the steps and dashed into their arms.
All of their arms, all at the same time. With a low chuckle, Nate wrapped me up in an embrace. Aaron was there at the next second, then Marco, and finally West, nuzzling the back of my neck.
Somewhere beyond the boundaries of our group hug, Kylie coughed and said, “I think I’ll leave the five of you alone for a while.”
I grinned, snuggling deeper into my mates’ embrace. Their smells, salty and musky, spicy and piney, mingled together into the headiest perfume. Their warmth enveloped me. The love inside me swelled to meet it, filling every part of my body with its giddy glow.
It wasn’t enough just to feel that love. It was time I did something with all that emotion.
“Last night was amazing,” Aaron said. “The way your fire reached all the way to us.”
“Well, I think it’s the fae you can thank for that,” I said.
“And who’s idea was it again to reach out to the fae?” Marco said, amused.
Nate pressed a kiss to my forehead. “You kept the flames going for so long. The vampires didn’t know what hit them when all that fire started flooding over them.”
“She held the shift even after she was done with her fire-breathing,” West said, the pride in his tone tingling over me. “I think we’ve got a fully-fledged dragon shifter on our hands now.”
“About that…” I wet my lips, feeling abruptly shy.
“Serenity?” Aaron said gently.
I ducked my head. “I was thinking… Our kin have gone too long with only one dragon shifter around. Maybe it’s time to see if we can add to that number?”
I’d thought maybe I’d need to be a little less coy before they’d get my meaning. Nope. A tremor of anticipation passed through the bodies around me with a collective intake of breath. “Ren,” West said behind me, sounding incredulous and eager all at once.
Marco’s lips curled up. “Our Princess of Flames wants to make a princess of her own. I think we can fulfill that request. To the lady’s bedroom?”
We walked into the house together, the bond between us making me feel so light my feet hardly seemed to touch the ground. When we reached my bed, I paused at the foot of it. Hunger thrummed through me, but underneath it a quiver of uncertainty passed through me.
“You decide how you want this to go,” Aaron said. “We’ll follow your lead.”
I clambered onto the bed and sat down in the middle of the huge mattress. Th
en I patted the sheet. My mates moved to join me, settling in a ring around me.
I reached for Aaron first, pulling him into a kiss. His hand drifted over my belly. I leaned back to find Nate’s mouth next, and the eagle shifter bent to nibble my shoulder, his hot breath spilling over my skin.
Nate kissed me deeply, easing down the strap of my dress as he did. I turned from him to Marco. The jaguar shifter’s tongue teased my lips and slipped between them to tangle with mine.
Someone was easing my dress down to my waist now. Another hand was caressing my breasts. A tremor of pleasure rippled through my nerves. I whimpered against Marco’s mouth.
Then there was West. My stubborn wolf. He pressed his lips to mine as if he meant to memorize the shape of them, to chart every curve of my mouth, every hitch of my breath. His fingers trailed over my hip, and the sense of how I wanted this to go swam up through the thickening haze of bliss. From the end to the beginning, back the way I’d come.
For the first several minutes, though, I just floated on that bliss. My mouth moved to meet one of my mates and another’s and another’s in turn, and then down to the heated skin of necks and chests. Four pairs of hands stripped my dress, my bra, and my panties off me. Somewhere in there I tugged off their clothes too.
Teasing fingers explored every inch of my body. A mouth closed over one nipple. A thumb flicked over the other. I gasped as one of my mates stroked between my legs. My eyelids fluttered shut.
But I knew exactly where West was when I wanted him. I reached out to cup his face. “Please,” I said, breathless.
His eyes darkened with lust. He kissed me so thoroughly it left my head spinning. Then he eased between my legs. The head of his cock brushed over my clit, and I whimpered. My hands traced up the lean muscles of his chest to clasp behind his neck. “I love you,” I whispered.
He exhaled shakily. “I love you too, Sparks. And I won’t let you ever doubt it again.”
